As Tall As Lions at The Station - 12/15

I just recently discovered As Tall As Lions through a friend at school and two free MP3s from Stereogum.com. I got a chance to see them this past weekend, and it was a great way to finish the 2007 concert year.

There were three other bands. Two of them were opening acts, but I didn't care much for them. Local band Sparks The Rescue played a style of very commercialized emo rock, and I'm never in the mood for stuff like that. Therefore I Am was hardcore/emo, and they didn't really have anything unique to offer as well. The Receiving End of Sirens played after As Tall As Lions, but I had to get back to the campus before it got too late, so I ended up missing their performance.

Anyhow, I went to the show to see As Tall As Lions, and I was very impressed by their performance. They played a good mix of rock and ambient music, mixing dreamy keyboards, falsetto vocals, and chilled out guitar. That's not to say that all of their music was really mellow, though. There were a few songs where the punk rock kicked in with faster tempos and edgier guitars.

The band reminded me of one of my favorites, The Everyday Visuals. They used a lot of layering with guitars, vocals, and keyboards to give their overall sound a textured feel; very much like TEV. As Tall As Lions also incorporated harmonies into some of their songs, and it sounded pretty nice. It's too bad The Station is so focused on making every show extremely loud, because if this band was given better sound mixing, they would sound a whole lot better. The Station needs to recognize that some bands don't need to be really loud in order to sound good. Besides that, my only other disappointments were that they took a while to set up, therefore taking away playtime, and they didn't play one of my favorite songs "Love, Love, Love (Love Love)". Besides that, it was a show very worthwhile, and I hope they come up to Portland again!

Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/astallaslions
Website: http://www.astallaslions.com/